Just What I Need
by SuperSillyStories
Summary: A one-shot for myself, to get out some feelings and things that I can't say.


_**So I was selfish today and wrote a one-shot for myself. It's not an easy topic to endure, so if you're squeamish or….otherwise, maybe you shouldn't read this. No one has to feel obligated to review or message or anything, it's just something that I need to do for myself. Oh, and the friend's name has been changed, because I'm not that much of a prick.**_

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"How could you do that to yourself!? You've never done something like that before; I don't know what would possess you to do it now! What would make you do it huh? Why would you do this?" I said rather loudly to my friend, holding her hand so I could gaze at the tiny cut on her wrist. Sure, it was short and it looked like a bad paper cut, but that's how it starts out. That's always how it starts out.

"Me? Take a look at yourself you fucking hypocrite!" She spat and yanked her wrist away from me. "How dare you!"

"Me? What are you talking about?"

"How dare you talk down to me, up there on your fucking high horse? It's not like I do this every god damn day because I feel like it, I just wanted to try it and see what it was like!" She retorted, shoving her books into her schoolbag.

"Why would you want to see what it was like?" I sighed staring up at her, watching her get her belongings together to leave.

"Because you do it! You're always doing it! You do the same god damn thing to me and I'm tired of this bullshit!" She growled and slung the bag over her shoulders. "Every fucking time and I'm so tired of it. I ask you not to do it anymore, you promise me you won't do it, and what do you do? You fucking run off a week later and cut up your arm!" I cringed hearing her say those words in such an angry voice. "Oh and don't think I didn't notice your thigh when we were changing when we went to the gym. Do you think I'm fucking stupid!?" She shouted again, making several crowds of students hanging out on the quad turn their heads at us. "You cut yourself up like you're god damn Freddy Krueger! You think I actually believed that 'oh my cat did it' lie? Your cat couldn't do that, that cut looks like you drove a scalpel into your leg!"

Actually, it was the blades taken from a disposable razor, but it did the job all the same.

"Kara…please—"

"NO! NO PLEASE I'M NOT DOING ANYTHING FOR YOU!" She shouted again. "You can't be honest with me, so why do I have to be quiet now? Why should I do something for you when you can't even make a promise to me to stop hurting yourself!?"

"It's not that easy to make that promise Kara, you don't understand, it's addicting, it's—"

"No it's not fucking addicting!" She interrupted me. "I did it, and I never want to do that again, that's fucking pointless! Ugh, let me know when you'll **cut** this bullshit out." She shook her head and sighed, running her fingers through her hair. "I'm tired of this Amanda. I'm tired of you doing this to yourself and not giving any reasons!"

"Kara please don't go I'm sorry!" I stood up quickly and took two steps after her, and she quickly turned around and shook her head at me. "You're not sorry, I know it. You love it. You love doing that to yourself and you don't care if it hurts any of your friends, you just care about yourself, you're absolutely selfish." She shook her head and walked away from me, leaving me standing there by myself while several people stared at me, murmuring to their friends without taking their eyes off of me. I swallowed, feeling ashamed and self-conscious and slung my bag over my shoulder, quickly rushing away from the campus. I felt someone call after me, but I ignored it and quickly dug out my iPod, shoving the buds into my ears and pressing play.

It is incredibly addicting. To press the blade on your skin and pull the blade across so quickly, that it takes several seconds for the cut to even open before the blood seeps out. The first time you do it, it hurts and you question why you ever did that to yourself. Why you ever marked your unscathed skin. But then you get the urge to do it again, those feelings that drove you to doing it in the first place just march their way into your mind, murdering any thoughts that ever made you feel happy and safe. So you pick up your box cutter, your disposable razor, your blade from the pencil sharpener, and you drag it across your skin once more. But sometimes once isn't enough, so you'll do it again, and again, until you have three, maybe four lines resting on your wrist, oozing blood before you can even comprehend what just happened. But it feels good, like you're releasing all the bad demons from your body. A type of high that makes you feel like you're strong, because you survive hurting yourself. A type of feeling that makes you think 'yeah, if I could do that to myself I could do anything'.

It's hard to explain, it's different for everyone, but once you start, you definitely can't stop. Sometimes you won't even get the feelings that you used to get, but you'll just have the urge to cut yourself. When it suddenly crosses your mind that you haven't done it in a long time, you get the urge to break that record and just ruin it. Then people start noticing, the weather gets warmer, the scars aren't fading as quickly as they should, and that's when the questions begin.

It was my cat.

It's a paper cut.

I fell and scraped my arm.

A nail was poking out from the fence and I scratched myself.

You'll blame it on anything, and somehow it always works perfectly, and you're always believed. No one questions it because they don't know that behavior from you. Because after you cut yourself and relinquish those inner demons, you force that smile back on your face and make everyone believe that you're okay! You can only pretend for so long…

But you're not okay, and you wish someone would be able to see that, you wish someone could just…_try_ and be there for you. You wish that someone would say _no, it wasn't your cat, what's wrong?_

But sometimes, even when you get that from someone, they just don't understand. They see you as crazy, maybe you are, maybe you're not, but they look at you differently. They constantly worry for you, and knowing that they walk on eggshells around you just makes you feel worse. Then if you ever look sad they ask 'did you cut yourself', and usually you never did, until they mentioned it because the constant mention of you cutting yourself when you're trying to stop just makes you relapse.

Every. Single. Time.

It's a nightmare, a complete and utter nightmare, and sometimes those feelings get so much worse. They go to the point of wanting to drag that blade a little further down your wrist, make it a little deeper, and press a lot harder. They come to the point where every place you go, you look around wondering how you're going to end it all, just in case you feel the need to. They get to the point where you're constantly feeling useless, depressed, unloved, only feeling happy for short periods of time because there happens to be one event that makes you happy. The rest of the time you just force yourself to smile and pretend you're okay…

But look what I've done. I've upset my best friend, the person who is supposed to be my rock and at least try to understand what I'm going through. But I've stressed her out to the point where she won't even try anymore, and that makes me want to stop trying all together.

I walked through the front door, happy to hear complete silence because no one was home. I jogged up to my room, threw everything on the bed and went digging through my desk drawer. I found the case I was looking for, the case that holds my glasses. I removed the felt lining on the inside and grabbed the small blade. I grabbed the tissue box and set it beside me on the bed when I flopped down. I pressed my back against the wall and rolled up each of my sleeves. I looked for a decent spot, today looks like a bicep kind of day. I dug the blade inside, and dragged it across my bicep three times. I sighed and held the blade in one hand as I let my head fall back against the wall. I closed my eyes and sighed feeling the blood slowly dribble down my arm.

She's right, I do love it. I've come to the point where I've done it so much that I've started to enjoy sinking that blade into my skin.

I looked down at my arm, raising the tissue to wipe at the blood when there was a hard knock at the door. I froze and decided to ignore it, wiping at my arm again until I heard more frantic knocking and a familiar voice behind the door.

"Amanda! I know you're home! I followed you ya know! But I'm not a stalker…well…I mean….you know what I mean!" I could hear Carlos yelling through the door. I sighed and put a few tissues on my arm and rolled my shirt sleeve back down. I ran down the stairs and opened the door just a bit to poke my head out.

"Yeah? What's up?" I questioned casually, as though nothing was wrong. As though my chest didn't feel heavy and I didn't feel like crawling into a hole and burying myself alive.

"I heard your fight with Kara." He nodded to me and twisted his snapback around behind his head. "Can I come in?"

"Now's not a good time actually…I'm really busy and—"

"I won't leave." Carlos interrupted. "I'll stay, and listen, I'll be completely quiet if you want, just talk to me!" He begged, and I just sighed and shook my head, looking down at my feet.

"Don't you have like….a party to go to with the guys later on—"

"There's always going to be a party, it won't hurt to miss one." Carlos nodded to me. "Let me in Amanda, and not …not just inside the house." He sighed the last part. I chewed on my lip and opened the door more so he could step inside. Carlos walked in and shut the door behind him, following me upstairs as I went to my room. The two of us sat down on my bed, and I was completely quiet, staring at the ground but feeling his gaze burn right through me. "Can I see?"

"Why do you want to?"

"I've…I've never seen them." He said, and you could just hear a hint of guilt in his voice, or is it pity? "You...always with the long sleeves…I never saw it."

Or the foundation.

Or tanning lotion.

"Okay…" I nodded quietly and pulled my sleeves all the way up and sticking my arms out to him. Carlos gently held my wrist and scanned over my arms.

"Is that all?" He whispered softly and I shook my head, he nodded in understanding and sighed. "Why do you do it Amanda?"

I didn't want to tell him, I didn't want to tell him all the reasons why I do it. How I feel so insignificant, worthless, like I don't matter to anyone at all. That I feel if I was never born, there would be anything different at all with the world. "If you don't want to tell me…that's okay, I understand." He nodded and let go of my wrists. "But I'll listen, and I won't say a word and I won't judge you at all, but I'll be there for you, and if you want my help, I'll give it to you."

"I…I…uh…..thank you." I nodded, unsure of how to deal with this. Carlos nodded and pulled me into his arms, laying my head on his shoulder and rubbing his hands up and down my back, and I found myself crying instantly. Crying because someone wasn't going to judge me, he was willing to just sit there and listen and not criticize why I do it. He didn't even flinch; he just took it all in and nodded, offering instant comfort.

Maybe that's all I've wanted.

Maybe that's all I've needed, someone to not judge me, to just be there and tell me they'll be there for me, we've never even been that close before, friends, that's all we've been. We've flirted around once or twice just messing around, but….we're not nearly as close to each other as I am with Kara, and here he is, almost a stranger to everything that's wrong with me and what goes on in my head that makes me hate myself so god damn much.

Maybe….maybe all I needed was a bit of comfort.

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_**I read this over, maybe it doesn't make sense. Maybe it's completely stupid, and I might just take it down. But I can't speak. I'm horrible at speaking, I can't convey a god damn thing with spoken words, but when it comes to writing, I think maybe that's the only thing I can do.**_


End file.
